First, lower school students, or as we would call them middle school students, have a much lower rate of spread compared to 18 year olds in high school. The age brackets here are a little off, but it shows the effect [0].
But more importantly, what I've said in several posts now is that you are presenting a false dichotomy, which another poster points out you in your fentanyl argument as well. The choice was not "close schools" or "keep schools open". The choice was "How do we teach and keep everyone safe". Keeping schools open in various parts of the country and failing to implement proper safety measures resulted in tragic losses of brilliant young teachers who didn't have to die. Your feelings about the magnitude of the Sweden results notwithstanding, they still show increased risk for teachers; the case of Georgia where dozens of young teachers and school staff have died in such a short time, leading to shortages and closures out of necessity rather than caution, shows how COVID can easily disrupt the entire school system, despite students not transmitting the virus.
> "30-40 percent of minority and low-income students weren’t learning during lockdowns"
A lot of that has to do with the inequitable distribution of resources and access to things like wifi, computers, and quiet spaces for study. We have been advocating for funding for these things for a long time, for precisely this reason. The factors that cause minorities and low income students to have trouble learning during the pandemic are the very same reasons they struggle during normal times. Remember school lunch debt is a thing. Do you think hungry students learn well in the classroom?
It's really quite astounding to me that some of the loudest voices decrying school closures during lockdowns will be the ones standing in the way of increased support of the kind that would alleviate these inequities.